This article was first produced in July 2024.
Hi, I am Michael founder of Ground Control.
Ground Control celebrated its 10th anniversary last year.
A decade! That’s 521 weeks or 3650 days or 87,600 hours or…well you get the idea. It’s a significant chunk of time for a creative SME to thrive. To be honest, it came as a surprise to me to realise we’re ten years old. Like when your kid becomes a teenager and you think how could that be? It goes so fast.
So with this milestone reached, like New Year rituals on steroids, a decade begs for some reflection. After all, it’s the only way to really be able to face the future isn’t it? Putting fingertips to the keyboard I’ve challenged myself to document some of the thoughts and lessons from running the business I founded ten years ago.
In some ways this is quite a simple story: I’ve built a creative business which has flourished; handled huge projects as well as small noodle-y ones, worked with household names, discovered wonderful talent and navigated our way through a whole host of challenges.
It was a conscious decision to be ‘great’ rather than ‘big’. I credit this strategy as the reason we’ve been able to punch well above our weight. I’m proud of so many of our achievements. Yet, I’m more than grateful we’ve just survived.
If rough seas make a sailor, then we certainly have our sea legs now. We’ve made it through periods of acute uncertainty, dry spells, a management buyout, mental anguish, poached talent, poached talent coming back, the pandemic, rent hikes, cost hikes, recession and recently (for the first time ever) a client not paying their bill. It was a big slug of cash for a small company to lose, and, as we always do, we’d already paid all our crew and suppliers. I’d rather be on the right side of history.
On the other hand, we’ve celebrated highs, worked with world class talent, world class athletes, celebrities, shooting in all corners of the world, with multinational clients in several languages, meeting wonderful people. We’ve expanded, retracted, expanded again. We’ve assimilated my dog as an office dog and had countless hugs from grateful clients. It’s been quite the ride.
My objective here is by no means to self-promote, in fact, I was really writing this for myself, but as it was all flying out of my brain, I thought others might find it useful on some level. So I’m opening myself up. All my vulnerability placed on the www for all to poke at. This isn’t an exhaustive list nor a definitive summation. Just my genuine takeaways from across the past decade:
1. Honesty and transparency is the safest and most risk-free way of doing business. Under-promise, over deliver. Never ever BS.
2. Seek excellence, not perfection. It’s a fine line. Perfection is never the destination. It’s unachievable and makes you miserable when constantly chasing something that can never be achieved. Mostly for reasons outside your control.
3. Stuff worth doing is hard! Limits are there to be pushed. Like going to the gym, if your goal is betterment, pushing past the normal threshold is the only way.
4. Any feeling will always pass. I’ve been through countless times when I thought my career was over. A project going south, wanting to throw it all away – feeling I can’t handle this anymore. Yet in every case, it wasn’t the end of my career, in fact, it was probably a turning point where my career became stronger. I guess this chimes back to that learning to sail in rough seas analogy.
5. Empathy is the most important human attribute in business as well as life. My mantra for vying for work is ‘vision and empathy’. If I can put myself in the clients’ shoes, understand what they need and show them how that will be achieved, we are more likely to confirm the work.
6. Sales is the most important part of building a business. Proactively getting in touch with the right people is the only way to make work happen regularly.
7. Kindness, joy and energy will get people to work with you much more effectively. Although I can’t make that judgment as a comparison because I’ve never worked any other way.
8. Always say good morning, especially in situations people aren’t used to it. It’s remarkable that on all the shoots I produce, every time I go to every single crew member to introduce myself and say good morning, they always tell me that’s rare for a producer to do and how nice it is. It’s amazing how many great conversations happen because of that one simple polite gesture. It really helps people open up and build relationships. This is key to creating a respectful productive environment for everyone.
9. Similarly – go and say thank you! At the end of each day. To. Every. One. Once I missed someone, and called them as they were driving home. They were a bit put back – I could feel them think, ‘Why was I calling? the day’s done’. I said, ‘You’d gone before I’d had the chance to say thanks’. They were left in a bit of shock. They were genuinely moved. It created a great energy. Of course I miss people sometimes, but I try to get to everyone.
10. In person meetings are still, even after all the changes since the pandemic, the most effective, efficient and enjoyable way of making stuff happen. That’s not to say stuff doesn’t happen when we work remotely but when teams are remote, I regularly wish we were all in the same place. I’ve always said London was the world’s capital of creativity because of Soho’s proximity. Everyone in creative industries in a tiny area had energy from each other. Face to face is important.
11. You cannot succeed on your own. Simple really.
12. Fancy mission statements aren’t very important, but everyone seemingly has to have one. In our industry they are all saying the same thing, but culture and actions are louder than mission statements. The more fancy you say it doesn’t make anyone better. We do everything in our control to do the best for our clients. We mean what we say. No fake facade, no sexy strapline. Always stay honest and truthful to ourselves and everyone else.
13. Communication is the foundation of all projects. Creativity doesn’t happen without good communication.
14. You will constantly learn if you pay attention. Obvs.
15. Celebrate every win. Just have a celebration song played aloud each and every time you confirm a project. I used to question why footballers go wild when they score a goal when moments later, they could be losing a match. ‘Don’t celebrate until you win the World Cup!’ I forever thought; but I was wrong! If you don’t celebrate the wins along the way you are missing the joys that fuels the passion for what we do. Never procrastinate on feeling good. It’s the motivation to keep raising your game.
16. Admit when you’re wrong. Everyone is wrong sometimes. Everyone. Covering up mistakes is for losers.
17. Self-deprecate all you want but remember to praise yourself regularly for what you achieve, however small or seemingly insignificant. You are not an imposter.
18. Framework thinking and process makes business better. Process and knowhow are excellent ways to add value to any business.
19. Every now and then a new game changing technology comes alive, embrace it. Fear is a trap.
That’s it for now. They weren’t in any particular order. And I’m sure there are more.
I suppose my key takeaway from looking back over the decade is my wish to be acutely present the whole time, through every minute of every hour of the next 10 years. Just like being with my kids, I don’t want to look back and feel bewildered at how quickly time has flown by, I don’t want to feel I was ever asleep behind life’s big turning wheel, I want to feel confident I was really there.
If you’ve read this far, wow! I’m impressed. I hope it wasn’t too self-indulgent and provided food for thought, or even just a light snack.